Cashless banking best solution for black money problem: Narendra Modi

[prasad1]

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Pitching for greater cashless banking transactions, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said this can be the best solution for the problem of black money, even as he asked banks to look for ways to discourage people from investing huge amounts in gold.


Modi also asked banks to become socially more responsible and provide support to 'swachhata' entrepreneurs or those setting up cleanliness and waste management ventures. He said banks in India should compete for achieving maximum cashless transactions, as this would be the "best solution" to the problem of black money. "Of many solutions to tame black money, cashless transaction is one of the very important solutions. This is a very big opportunity and we should promote this. People should inculcate the habit of cashless transaction," he said.


Black money has been a major political issue in the recent past, including in the Lok Sabha polls last year in which Modi led BJP and its allies to a landslide victory. Modi also said Indians have a good habit of savings, but these savings have diverted to gold over the time as a measure of security and banks have a challenge to look into ways to discourage huge amounts of money being kept in gold. The Prime Minister said people in India had a propensity towards saving, but this was targeted towards gold.


"The challenge for banks was to assure people that a bank account would ensure easy access to their savings whenever required," he said, while adding this could help banks become the agents of social transformation. The Prime Minister was speaking at a function here this evening to dedicate an 'ICICI Digital Village' to the nation. ICICI Bank has adopted Akodara village in Gujarat to develop it into a 'digital village' by providing facilities like cashless banking, e-health, as also digitised schools and mandis.


In 1965 my thesis was this very subject.
If i can find my original copy of this thesis I will post the reasons why I thought it will fail.
The conditions have changed in 40 years, but some of the barriers still remain.

 

[prasad1]

This point comes when a society goes cashless and the potential for econgularity is at its highest. A singularity is defined as the point in which technological advancement will "radically change human civilization and perhaps even human nature itself." It is impossible to know if this will actually happen, but a cashless society would certainly give governments unprecedented access to information and power over citizens. Currently, we have little evidence to indicate that governments will refrain from using this power. On the contrary, the U.S. government is already using its snooping prowess and big-data manipulation in some frightening ways.

The technological command of the National Security Agency has been widely reported on and does not need repeating here. Suffice it to note, that it would be no challenge for the NSA or certain other government agencies to monitor any company or consumer transaction in real time, if it so desired.
To provide another example, the U.S. government is becoming very fond of seizing money from citizens first and asking questions later via "civil forfeiture." Amazingly, the government is permitted by law to do this even if it is only government staff members who have a suspicion, not proof, of wrongdoing. By seizing a citizen's or a firm's money, the victim/defendant has almost no choice but to settle. A case about civil forfeiture was recently argued in front of the Supreme Court in which the government seized all the money of a tiny family-owned grocery store on the suspicion that it was laundering cash because its cash deposits were below the $10,000 level, an occurrence that triggers a report to the government. By depriving companies and individuals of the cash to defend themselves, even innocent firms are under immense pressure to settle or to plead guilty. To make matters worse, the dramatic consolidation of the banking system has made it easier for the government to acquire information as there are fewer access points. For example, JPMorgan, one of America's largest and most powerful banks, is the size of more than 3,000 smaller banks combined, and the top four U.S. banks control about 60 percent of the U.S. banking deposits.

What happens on the days and nights when banks are closed or your bank is not nearby. What happens when the system is down?

 

[krish44]

in countries like india, less the govt knows better it is for the citizen.

many had reservations about the aadhar card which gave govt access to private data with even bank

account for some.

Govt agencies are not known for fair action and can resort to witch hunting of those not in

agreement with their thinking.

police can equate the complainant victim with the wrong doer and harass innocents.

tax authorities misuse data to fix those who do not pay up.

also laws are framed in such a way that if you do minor infringement, many law sections get

violated. also justice is not fast enough to settle any case

most plead guilty for fast relief or pay money to escape law.